History of
The Healing House
How The Healing House (of New Mexico) began -
Duane’s grandfather, Dr. Samuel Redding Ziegler (MD), known as “Dr. Z”, was the first surgeon in the community on a mission trip from Ohio in 1943 to the underserved community of Espanola. With his wife, Isabel Howe Ziegler and two sons, Sam Jr. and Norman Ziegler, the family embarked on what they thought would be a short-term mission trip which would eventually develop into a lifelong commitment to excellence in medicine and a new place to call home.
After they settled into a small back room at the McCurdy school, they soon found they had outgrown the space with the birth of their first daughter and third child, Julie Gayle Ziegler. Along with the need for medicine in rural New Mexico, they sought out a homestead where they could practice medicine and raise their children. They soon moved down the street to Fairview Lane in Espanola, New Mexico.
The 200-year old home, orchard, and horse corrals soon expanded over the years with the help of their daughter Julie and her husband Ken Langille. For a short time, Dr. Z delivered thousands of babies out of a side room at his Fairview home and would soon realize again that more space was needed.
He initiated the expansion of medicine in the area with the help of dear and famous friends and embarked on a large project to facilitate the building of a large medical center. With the help of Arthur & Phoebe Pack of Ghost Ranch and Georgia O’Keeffe’s friend and patient to Dr. Z, they created, founded, and ran the first hospital. Named Espanola Valley Hospital over fifty years ago, still provides care as it operates under Presbyterian Hospital of Espanola today.
After the passing of Duane’s grandparents, Dr. Samuel and Isabel Ziegler along with the early passing of his parents, Julie and Ken Ziegler-Langille, Dr. Franco - Chavez and husband Duane moved back to Espanola to care for the property, and with hard work and creative planning opened “The Healing House (of New Mexico)” in 2018 at Ziegler Estates. They coined and trademarked “The Healing House” name because of their vision of health & wellness within the walls of what had birthed and healed many. Franco-Chavez also adding that her grandmother, a healer in the same community welcomed people in and out of her house for decades being of service to them. Thus “The Healing House” was recognized and honored as a place that held space for all forms of medicine.
Now in 2026 New Directions Institute 501©(3) DBA The Healing House Concepts was officially formed translating naturopathic wisdom into daily, doable rituals—at the clinic, in the kitchen, and throughout the neighborhood. Guided by the mantra “Designing Medicine • Creating Coherence • Detoxing the Chaos,” its programs blend primary-care–style naturopathic visits, kitchen-friendly detox labs, and culture-rich “Remedios & Stories” gatherings that weave food, art, and environmental design into practical health literacy.
At the helm is Dr. Jessyca Franco-Chavez, a self-described “harmonic custodian” whose desert-herbal lineage and clinical training inspire the nonprofit’s three conceptual “Houses of Healing”:
● Mental House – breathwork, narrative medicine, art-as-ritual to calm the nervous system.
● Physical House – root-cause care plans, pantry makeovers, and botanical protocols backed by outcome tracking.
● Social House – intergenerational cocina classes, herb walks, and farm-to-fork collaborations that build belonging.
Sliding-scale memberships, sponsor-a-neighbor funds, and mobile pop-ups keep services accessible, while research on stress, A1c, and community connectedness ties ancestral practice to measurable impact. In short, The Healing House Concepts invites every household CEO to “heal the body and curate the altar you live in.”
